Fair play for all

What started out as a toddler's private party has grown into a regular get-together where moms can buy and sell used baby products at cheaper prices. Yu Ran checks it out.

Shopaholic mums, it's time to pack up overbought children's items and sell them to others at Mama's Love Fair.

Founded by two young mothers in 2013, Mama's Love Fair takes place regularly in the city. It's more like a family party than a fair, allowing mothers to sell and exchange lightly used children's products while giving children a chance to gather and play.

The fair was first held as a small indoor birthday party. The organizers had requested their friends to bring unused or lightly used baby products and sell them cheaply to each other while their babies played together.

"It was our way of celebrating the first birthday of my daughter and my good friend Gina Jin's son by gathering our mutual friends, most of whom are also mothers, to have fun and help others out," says Haren Wan, one of the founders of the organization and the mother of a 21-month-old girl.

Wan adds that all of them enjoyed chatting and exchanging items, and left happily with what they needed after the party. Those mothers who participated in the first private event urged her to arrange a second fair to let them sell more used children's items.

"Every new mum is a shopaholic who buys everything cute in the store for her kid, when the baby actually grows up too quickly to use or even try on everything," says the mother of a two-year-old girl, Joan Yan, who sold several items at the fair.

Yan adds that she managed to sell her overbought items the first time she went and took her daughter to the fair a second time simply to play and make friends with other children.